Observed Behaviors

I started this thread as mainly a place to compare notes on any observed behaviors noticed during an encounter. Was the creature doing something when you saw it? If so, what was it doing?

This is not gonna be based on any scientific facts, just any behaviors noticed by witnesses during their encounter. Maybe we can compile some common behaviors of the creatures from the eyewitnesses.

April 2010 I was out on a trek with my wife. I was lucky enough to get to observe a creature for about 2 minutes. The creature was sitting down and it had a limb in its hands about 8 feet long and about 3 inches in diameter. It was very readily eating the bark from the limb and licking the yellow pine underneath with great enthusiasim after the bark was eaten. It was like it was enjoying something that was very delicious. I also noticed it's tongue was very long as it licked the limb. That also struck me as odd. A series of storms kept me out of the area for about a week. So due to all the rain, I did not collect the limb for DNA samples when I returned for the followup. Some have suggested I should have confronted the creature and collected the limb after it ran away, but I don't operate that way.

There's been alot of speculation about what the creatures eat. I too suspect they eat deer and turkey as well as some plants/berries and nuts, but the only thing I know for sure from my encounter is that they do eat bark from pine trees. It's in my personal notes under "Facts", although I can't prove this as scientific fact, I thought I'd share it for comparison. Chris B.

Appreciate that insight Chris, as this has been one of the more problematic areas for me. Evidence of food collection or food preference items and evidence left behind. Pines are limited but present in small quantities where I research. Though present they are sometimes hard to get to (other evergreens are even harder however).

Though I've seen evidence of bark stripping of deciduous trees, I have yet to witness anything but putative woodpecker disturbance on mostly diseased to dying pine trees.

It will certainly be something that I will keep my eye out for. Turkeys have been gobbling and the grouse are out so I suspect food sources are about. Still haven't seen a good deer herd in awhile though.

There's a lot of info out there, dealing with the eating of pine bark...I was surprised.

Every winter, we have a resident flock of Turkeys, that we feed. Last fall, nine of them had been coming down daily, for a few weeks.
One morning, only three of them showed up and that's all there were for the rest of the winter. This struck me as being strange, because every year, we end up with the same amount of turkeys at the end of the winter, as what we started with. Coyotes are the only predator around that prey on turkeys, that I know of anyway. I just couldn't imagine Coyotes taking six turkeys in one night.

It seems to me that these turkeys routine would be easy for a smart predator to predict. They follow the same path every day, coming and going. Not saying it was BF and doubt if it was. Just an observation that seemed odd and stuck in my mind.

Has anyone tried habituating turkeys to an area, to create a natural bait for BF?

Appreciate that insight Chris, as this has been one of the more problematic areas for me. Evidence of food collection or food preference items and evidence left behind.

We see constant evidence of stuff being eaten by something. Some of it by deer, porcupines, squirrels, hogs, bears, etc. The hard part is knowing/proving what ate what. We might be seeing the results of BF eating stuff, but recognizing and proving it is another story. How do you know if those berries were eaten by a bear or a bigfoot, or the lady at the campground down the road. You don't. We may see it all the time and just not know it.

17x7

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"Some people without brains do an awful lot of talking." -Scarecrow, Wizard of Oz

The same goes for destroyed rotting logs, could be a bear, could be a bigfoot.....but also you'd be surprised what damage a pileated woodpecker can do to downed wood be it sectioned timber or whole downed logs.

Sometimes i like to walk out in the woods in the rain and when i do it always seems wierd,like i am being watched. What is wierd about this is that i will have things thrown at me,not rocks but pine cones or sticks and what i will do is yell at who ever is throwing them at me and they will stop.

The other thing that I find alot is these big nutz that are cracked in half and are eaten along the trail.Not the kinda of nutz that a human would eat but they are kinda of big and they taste like crap but yet i find them everywhere.

During hunting season I once notice one of them watching me ,so what i did was showed them my shotgun in the air above my head so that they know I meant them no harmbut that did nothing.The glimpse i got was one of them moving from one tree to another tree along a ridge line. There is more like them leaving prints as though they wanted me to find them on ridges, but the oddest thing that has ever happen to me was when i asked for a crows feather from them and they some how gave me one that same day.

That crows feather that I asked for was the strangest event I have ever encountered because no one knew about it except for me and a friend who has hunted with me.I did not tell my friend until I was in my truck what I did. There is no explanation for how it could have happened but yet it did.If these things are able to read minds well that day they proved it to me and my friend.Here is the picture of that feather of the crows feather with my 10mm glock:crow10.jpg1.57MB2 downloads

Thanks guys, hopefully someone may have witnessed one eating something similar or doing some other behavior so we can compare notes.

Interesting note about the crow feather. Did you see the creature leave the feather?

About the pine bark, I looked into the nutritional value of pine bark and it's supposed to be high in Vitamin C and a few other nutrients. The thing is, I don't know if that was part of its regular diet or it was eating the bark for some medical benefit as a result of some sickness/condition?

It got me to thinking, sometimes dogs and cats will eat grass when they're sick. So I dunno. If it were me I'd surely try to find something better to eat than pine bark. I think my sighting resulted with more questions than answers unfortunately. Chris B.

If they are killing wild Turkeys, I'd sure as heck like to see how they are able to outsmart them. Turkeys have amazing eyesight and hearing, and unlike a wild hog, they can do something a BF cant; take flight.

Hey Chris, cats eat grass to get rid of hairballs. Now the bark thing, I question how they can digest it easily. There gut must be made of sterner stuff than ours. I know people eat bark but it takes preparation to be able to eat a lot of it otherwise you get splinters in your gut. My co-worker saw a bigfoot outside her bedroom window eating bark from one of her trees. She is prissy, not into bigfoot at all, but knew I was interested so she confided in me.

Awesome info Jodie! That's 2 for tree bark, thanks. Did she happen to mention what kind of tree she has?

Krantz was one of my personal heroes. If bark is a regular food item, I'd agree that they must have an extra long gut to digest the rough stuff. That would open up the possibility of a wide assortment of food items that could be eaten, grasses, leaves, basically everything that we can't get enough nutrition from they could fatten up on.

pattywagon,
About the turkeys, catching a turkey would be difficult during the day. I'd bet they catch them on the roost at night (if they do eat turkeys) I've seen 50 or more turkeys roosting in a single tree at night. It'd be super easy to climb up and grab a few off the roost at night while the birds are blind. (I've heard stories about guys with .22 rifles taking several (dozens) birds at night while they were on the roost. I wouldn't do that myself as it's not only illegal but also immoral IMO) I think one of these creatures could easily snag a few off the roost at night without the benefit of a rifle. Chris B.

If bark is a regular food item, I'd agree that they must have an extra long gut to digest the rough stuff. That would open up the possibility of a wide assortment of food items that could be eaten, grasses, leaves, basically everything that we can't get enough nutrition from they could fatten up on.

It could also explain why they sometimes stink to high heaven... if they were real ofcourse

My brother, an anthropologist, studied the range of the Carrier people as part of a treaty proposal. A key cultural artifact was trees that had been peeled for food. The soft wood under the bark is jammed with nutrients including massive vitamin C.

I started this thread as mainly a place to compare notes on any observed behaviors noticed during an encounter. Was the creature doing something when you saw it? If so, what was it doing?

This is not gonna be based on any scientific facts, just any behaviors noticed by witnesses during their encounter. Maybe we can compile some common behaviors of the creatures from the eyewitnesses.

April 2010 I was out on a trek with my wife. I was lucky enough to get to observe a creature for about 2 minutes. The creature was sitting down and it had a limb in its hands about 8 feet long and about 3 inches in diameter. It was very readily eating the bark from the limb and licking the yellow pine underneath with great enthusiasim after the bark was eaten. It was like it was enjoying something that was very delicious. I also noticed it's tongue was very long as it licked the limb. That also struck me as odd. A series of storms kept me out of the area for about a week. So due to all the rain, I did not collect the limb for DNA samples when I returned for the followup. Some have suggested I should have confronted the creature and collected the limb after it ran away, but I don't operate that way.

There's been alot of speculation about what the creatures eat. I too suspect they eat deer and turkey as well as some plants/berries and nuts, but the only thing I know for sure from my encounter is that they do eat bark from pine trees. It's in my personal notes under "Facts", although I can't prove this as scientific fact, I thought I'd share it for comparison. Chris B.

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Threads are like hybrid cars, they run out of gas long before they stop.

About the turkeys, catching a turkey would be difficult during the day. I'd bet they catch them on the roost at night (if they do eat turkeys) I've seen 50 or more turkeys roosting in a single tree at night. It'd be super easy to climb up and grab a few off the roost at night while the birds are blind. (I've heard stories about guys with .22 rifles taking several (dozens) birds at night while they were on the roost. I wouldn't do that myself as it's not only illegal but also immoral IMO) I think one of these creatures could easily snag a few off the roost at night without the benefit of a rifle. Chris B.

Yes, though the turkeys are strong fliers and I've seen them fly upward above 60 ft. in the tops of large trees, they'd be less challenging at night.

BF would have to be an accomplished tree climber to do the turkey roost grab I would think though. The stories of BF catching three turkeys at a time in daylight do not ring true to me. If they can do that they have capabilities that are far in excess of some kind of adapted ape-like primate. Of course many report they do.

So if BF can grab a turkey in that manner there should be stories of them grabbing other roosting avians as well such as crows.....anybody heard of such?

Bipedalist and Chris, Yea, pulling them off of the roost after dark would be doable, I suppose, depending on how high up the tree they are roosting.
Could be a job for the younger, lighter ones to climb up trees that might not support a full grown BF.

We had a group of 20 or so turkeys that rusted in a tree next to a creek on our property, I’ve often thought that they would be easy target for a BF. We cut had and when a turkey is own the nest the hen will lay there and let you run over her trying to protect her eggs or chicks. Turkeys, turkey eggs and the chicks would be a good meal for a BF.

Awesome info Jodie! That's 2 for tree bark, thanks. Did she happen to mention what kind of tree she has?

It was a type of pine tree,she said that the bark that was missing was approximately 3 feet over her head when I asked her about it. She is 5'2". Her window is 6 feet off the ground so she saw it from the torso up initially and then moved closer to the window to look through the plantation blind slats. Her bedroom light was off but the outdoor light was on which was why she noticed it. She said it was picking the bark off the tree then turned and leaned against the tree with the back towards the window but she could see the profile of the face and right arm/hand. It was well groomed, the color of an irish setter, the hair on the arm ruffled in the wind and he had his head down with eyes closed, no ears noticed. She said the hands had shorter thicker fingers than ours with a longer palm. That matches my father's description of their hands so I believe she saw what she said she saw. She also lives on a lake that backs up to a national forest.

Just wanted to edit to add that the bigfoot did not seem to notice or hear her move towards the window. She left the room to get her husband and when he returned to the bedroom to look through the window the creature was gone.